TBA 4

A spectacular work horse in the morning that had yet to put it all together in the afternoon, Danzig Moon ran a creditable race in the Kentucky Derby to finish fifth in a field of 18 3-year-olds, beaten just over six lengths.

The bay son of Malibu Moon, sire of 2013 Derby winner Orb, Danzig Moon went winless in two starts as a juvenile before breaking through in his sophomore debut, a 4 ¾-length maiden special weight score going one mile Feb. 7 at Gulfstream Park.

Based at Palm Meadows, Gulfstream’s satellite training facility in Palm Beach County, trainer Mark Casse shipped Danzig Moon to Tampa Bay Downs where he was a non-threatening fourth in the Tampa Bay Derby (G2) March 7.

Danzig Moon showed a much better effort in his subsequent start, the 1 1/8-mile Blue Grass (G1), where he swung six wide at the quarter pole to launch a bid that came up three lengths short of winner Carpe Diem. They met again in the Derby, with Carpe Diem fading to finish 10th.

Jockey

He came to the U.S. from France in 2003 to exercise horses for Patrick Biancone in California, but it wasn’t long before Leparoux’s riding ability made him the trainer’s first-call rider.

Leparoux, 31, debuted at Saratoga Race Course in 2005, and won his first race that August aboard Easter Guardian. The following summer, he won 28 races at the nation’s oldest racetrack, the most ever by an apprentice jockey.

In 2006, Leparoux led all jockeys with 403 wins and $12,491,316 in purses, both records for “bug” riders, earning him the Eclipse Award as top apprentice. He was the first apprentice to win riding titles at both Churchill Downs and Keeneland, and has also been leading rider at Turfway Park.

Leparoux was voted his second Eclipse Award in 2009, winning 247 of 1,284 races and $18,560,565 in purses, also capturing three Breeders’ Cup races at Santa Anita – the Juvenile Fillies with She Be Wild, Filly & Mare Sprint with Informed Decision, and Dirt Mile with Furthest Land – and was selected the event’s top rider.

The only other jockeys besides Leparoux to win the Eclipse as both an apprentice and journeyman rider are Steve Cauthen, Kent Desormeaux and Chris McCarron, all Hall of Famers.

In the Preakness, Leparoux was second with Macho Again in 2008, ninth with General Quarters in 2009, 11th with Pleasant Prince in 2010, fourth with Dialed In in 2011 and ninth with Daddy Nose Best in 2012 and Titletown Five in 2013.

Owner

John C. Oxley

Founder of Oxley Petroleum, an oil and gas exploration firm based in his native Tulsa, Okla. in 1962, John C. Oxley is best known in the racing industry for owning 2001 Kentucky Derby winner Monarchos, whose time of 1:59.97 is second only to Secretariat in race history, and the multiple Grade 1-winning champion mare Beautiful Pleasure.

Monarchos was sixth as the second choice in a field of 11 in the 126th Preakness. Since then, Oxley has been represented on Old Hilltop by Grade 1 Fountain of Youth winner Booklet, who finished 12th in 2002, and last year by seventh-place finisher Dynamic Impact.

In 2012, Oxley walked away with four Sovereign Awards when he was chosen Canada’s top owner and campaigned champion 2-year-old male and Horse of the Year Uncaptured and champion 2-year-old female Spring in the Air. Uncaptured would go on to win the Prince of Wales Stakes, the second leg of Canada’s Triple Crown, in 2013. Oxley also won the race in 2012 with filly Dixie Strike, and earned the Sovereign as top owner again in 2014.

The son of Hall of Fame polo player John T. Oxley, he is also an accomplished polo player and member of the sport’s hall of fame, inducted in 2010. Oxley sold Oxley Petroleum in May 2003 and created Oxley Resources LLC, a smaller-scale oil and gas exploration and production venture.

Trainer

Mark Casse

A seven-time Sovereign Award winner as Canada’s top trainer (2006-08, 2011-14), Casse started his first Preakness horse last year in Dynamic Impact, who finished seventh. He is the son of famed horseman Norman Casse, who ran Cardinal Hill Farm and was a chairman of the board of the Ocala Breeders’ Sales Company.

Casse became hooked on racing at age 12 when he rode in a horse van on the way to watch Secretariat win the 1973 Kentucky Derby. Casse took out his trainer’s license at age 18 and became the private trainer for Harry Mangurian’s Mockingbird Farm.

For most of the year, Casse is based at Woodbine in Ontario, and also has divisions in Kentucky and Florida with his son, Norman. Together with his wife, Tina, he owns and operates Moonshadow Farm, a training center in Ocala, Fla.

In his career, Casse has won more than 1,800 races and $95 million in purse earnings. He has trained a trio of Canadian Horses of the Year in Sealy Hill (2007), Uncaptured (2012) and filly Lexie Lou (2014) and is a five-time Canadian classic winner, taking the Prince of Wales Stakes three times (2009, 2012-13) and the Breeders’ Stakes (2007) and Queen’s Plate (2014) once each.

Breeder

William D. Graham

More than four decades after suiting up as an offensive and defensive tackle in the Canadian Football League, Brampton, Ontario’s Bill Graham was inducted into Canada’s Horse Racing Hall of Fame last year as a thoroughbred builder.

Owner of Windhaven Farms in Caledon, Ontario and Lexington, Ky., Graham has been an integral racing participant in Canada as a breeder, owner and racing executive. He has bred several Sovereign Award-winning horses including 2012 Horse of the Year Uncaptured. That same year, Graham won his own Sovereign Award as champion breeder as well as being named Ontario’s Breeder of the Year.

Graham also bred Joyful Victory, winner of the 2013 Santa Margarita (G1) at Santa Anita. He was appointed to the Ontario Racing Commission in 1985 and the Jockey Club of Canada in 1987.

In 1959, one year after the CFL was founded, Graham joined the Toronto Argonauts before playing for the Calgary Stampeders in 1960 and British Columbia Lions in 1961. Commitments to the family construction business cut his playing career short but he continued to play senior football with the 1967 champion Bramalea Satellites.